


Eia au, eia ‘oe

by kinderjedi



Series: Words of Love [1]
Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-29
Updated: 2020-03-01
Packaged: 2021-02-28 05:54:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,819
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22959004
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kinderjedi/pseuds/kinderjedi
Summary: After the events of 3x01, Steve needs... something.  He’s not sure what. Luckily, Danny’s there for him.
Relationships: Steve McGarrett/Danny "Danno" Williams
Series: Words of Love [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1651099
Comments: 15
Kudos: 85





	1. Chapter 1

He was already two bottles down when Danny showed up. 

Steve heard him call out when he let himself in but he didn’t move from his spot on the sand. He’d come home and gone immediately for a swim, just walked straight through to the laundry and kicked off his boots. He’d stripped down right there in the late afternoon sun and reached to pluck the boardies he’d worn that morning off the line strung up next to the washer and dryer. 

The swim hadn’t helped. He’d pushed his body hard and fast through the water, aiming to stay out there until he couldn’t think any more. His mind, however, refused to let go. It was deep into twilight when he gave up and headed back to shore, his arms and legs achy from the workout. So he’d rinsed off and pulled on some dry shorts, then flopped into his usual chair outside, armed with a six-pack of Longboards and glaring out at the waves like they’d personally betrayed him. 

“You are out of it,” Danny said, close behind him. “Don’t tell me I got the jump on you, SuperSEAL.” Steve managed a crooked smile as he glanced up. The taut line of his shoulders softened a little. He stopped picking at the label on his second empty and put it down as he watched Danny sink into the other chair. 

“I heard you,” he said, because he had a reputation to uphold, after all. “Besides, who else just lets themselves into my house? Mary’s on the mainland. And my mom—“ Steve halted right there and shrugged. 

“Uh-huh.” Danny gave him a look. “So you heard me. You heard the part where I yelled I brought dinner and beer, too? Not that you look like you’re lacking, not where the beer’s concerned, at least.” Danny reached down to snag the carton and stood up, turning toward the house. “C’mon, I got a pizza with your name on it. Even got half the way you like it.” 

Steve looked up at that. “This, I’ve gotta see.” He pushed himself upright and grabbed the two empties as he followed behind Danny. Steve put the empty bottles on the counter and moved to open the cabinet for plates, but Danny nudged him away. 

“I’ve got it. All you have to do is take the pie and the beer into the living room. Get comfortable.” 

Steve opened his mouth to protest, but somehow, he just didn’t have it in him to snark back at Danny about making himself at home. Instead, he just followed orders, picked up the pizza and the beer and carried them into the living room. He deposited everything on the coffee table and sank down on the edge of the sofa. A growl from his stomach reminded him that lunch had been a long time ago, and Steve lifted the lid of the box to check out the contents. Half plain cheese, half ham and pineapple. 

He looked up as Danny came in with plates and napkins. “They gonna let you back in Jersey after this?” 

Danny snorted. “Jersey don’t have to find out. Besides, not like I’m going to eat any of your half. I’ll survive tonight, I guess.” He pulled the box the rest of the way open and got himself two slices from the plain half. “Open the beer, will you?” He moved on to fill Steve’s plate. 

“Yeah,” Steve said, reaching to crack open fresh bottles for them both. He traded a beer for his plate, then looked down at the pizza for a long moment. “Thanks for this, Danno.” 

“Thank me by eating it,” Danny replied. “Preferably all of it, so I don’t have to look at it anymore.” But his tone was light, and he settled back onto the sofa as he dug into a slice.

Steve attacked his own plate. He had an entire slice polished off in just a few bites. “Guess I was hungrier than I thought,” he said as he reached for his beer and took a long swallow. 

“Long day. And you didn’t eat much at lunch, that I saw. Then I guess you came home and swam another, what, five miles? Ten?” Danny shot him a knowing look, a glimmer of worry in his eyes. 

“I ate,” Steve protested, but then he stopped and thought about it with the bottle still in his hand, his brow wrinkled as he tried to remember what he’d eaten. “And it wasn’t ten miles... maybe five,” he conceded. “I don’t know how far, really. Just… needed to clear my head.” 

Danny nodded. “Did it work?”

“Not so much,” Steve admitted. 

“You wanna talk about it?” 

Steve drained the rest of his beer, then reached for another. “Not really.” 

“You wanna get drunk, then? Because, as a friend, I feel I should tell you that 30-year-old scotch you got in the liquor cabinet is gonna get you loaded a hell of a lot faster than this.” Danny waved the hand wrapped around his bottle. 

“Nah.” Steve gave a sharp shake of his head as he sank down further into the cushions. “Don’t wanna get smashed.” His voice was already softening, though, the lilt he suppressed most of the time beginning to surface. 

Danny watched Steve quietly for a few minutes as the two of them made their way through the pizza and Steve started on another beer. At some point, Danny flicked the tv on and they ended up watching a replay of an old Yankees game he was pretty sure he’d seen before, the sound turned low as they both stared at the screen. He glanced over now and then, wondering if Steve was really following the game. 

As soon as their plates were empty, the last of the pizza gone, Danny stacked them on top of the empty box. As he settled in again, he reached over to rest his hand on Steve’s shoulder. 

Neither of them spoke, but they didn’t always need to, not with the way they could read each other, that vocabulary that had been quietly building since day one. Or maybe day two, actually, Danny thought. He’d gotten in Steve’s face and gotten his arm nearly ninjaed right out of joint, then turned around and popped Steve in the jaw for it. The hell of it was, Danny still wasn’t sure that _wasn’t_ the moment this whole thing had begun. Because they had a thing, he and Steve. They _were_ a thing, moving toward a bigger, better, slightly terrifying but utterly undeniable _thing_. And they both knew it. 

Knew it, and hadn’t done anything about it, yet, both content to just let it ride, see how it unfolded without forcing the issue, Kono and Chin and HPD and their betting pool’s increasingly unsubtle hints notwithstanding. 

So they sat there through another inning or two, the both of them sinking more comfortably into the couch as the game progressed, until finally the Yankees won it on a walk-off slam in the thirteenth. 

Steve’s shoulder was pressed against him, like at some point he’d just started tilting in Danny’s direction, and Danny had adjusted as the game wore on, his arm stretching along the sofa behind Steve. It felt good. Comfortable. And without thinking he shifted, lifting his hand and settling it in Steve’s hair. 

The way Steve started confirmed for Danny that he’d been half asleep, but when Steve turned sharply to him he also saw the lingering shadows in his eyes, dark and turbulent. Maybe not half asleep, then, but lost in his head. Shit. “Whoa, easy,” Danny murmured, sliding his hand down to the nape of Steve’s neck to rub it in light, soothing circles. “I take it baseball was not the distraction it could’ve been?” 

Steve gazed at him for a long moment, then shook his head. “Sorry, Danno, I just…” He rubbed a hand over his face. “I appreciate the company, and the dinner and everything. I just… I keep going back over everything.” Japan. Standing in front of that house, staring at his mother. The mother he’d thought dead. 

The lies his mother had told. Then and now. 

And that didn’t even touch what had happened here at home while he’d been gone. He’d gotten his mother back, sort of. But Chin—he’d lost his wife. Malia. Steve made some soft, wordless noise and shook his head again. But he leaned in a tiny bit closer.

Danny slid his hand back up into Steve’s hair when he didn’t shy away and scratched at his scalp with careful fingers. “That is… totally understandable, babe. You don’t have to explain yourself to me. Not if you don’t want to,” he murmured. “You wanna just get some sleep?” 

Steve made a noncommittal noise, but he shifted against Danny, tipped the rest of the way over and settled with his head on Danny’s shoulder. “In a minute, maybe. This feels good,” he admitted. His voice was quiet. 

“Yeah?” Danny smiled softly as Steve came to rest. One of the Navy’s fiercest warriors, a man who took no shit from anyone, but here like this Steve just looked young. Soft, somehow, though Danny would never say so to Steve, not in so many words. He valued the trust Steve placed in him, though, letting him close when his defenses were down. “Well, you can have all of this you want, Steven,” he murmured. “I’m all yours.” 

Steve hummed softly in answer. “Me too, Daniel,” he added a second later. 

“Oh yeah?” Danny cradled Steve’s head as he planted a soft kiss in his hair. He felt the way Steve shifted, that innocent, comforting embrace subtly changing, as simple as Steve sliding his hand to rest on Danny’s leg and Danny slipping his hand down to stroke the side of Steve’s neck. It was everything it had been— _they_ were everything they had been. But now they were more. 

Just like that. “That is good to know.” 

How long they stayed like that, Danny wasn’t sure. But when _SportsCenter_ began to repeat he cleared up the dinner mess and checked the house was locked up while Steve headed upstairs to shower. And then he followed, familiar enough with the nightly routine here to feel at home. 

But he wasn’t sleeping in the guest bedroom or on the couch. Danny found a pair of shorts to sleep in and when Steve emerged from the shower they switched places like they’d done this a hundred or a thousand nights before, getting ready for bed in each other’s orbit. He smiled when he saw the new toothbrush left on the edge of the sink, the shampoo and conditioner he liked in the shower. Like Steve had been ready. Waiting.


	2. Chapter 2

When Danny emerged from the bathroom Steve was already in bed, curled on his side and watching for him. Steve kept watching as Danny dropped his dirty clothes in the hamper and approached the bed. They were both sleeping in just shorts, and he tracked Danny’s every move as he sank onto the edge of the mattress and turned out the lamp, leaving them with just the bright moonlight streaming through the window as he slid beneath the covers and turned on his side facing Steve. 

Steve wasn’t sure which of them moved first, but suddenly they had gone from curled up and facing each other with a few inches of mattress between them to legs and arms touching, close enough that he could feel Danny’s breath warm on his cheek. Steve reached up, then, his hand grazing against Danny’s bare chest as he moved it up to touch his face. 

He just looked and touched, at first, his eyes on Danny as the pads of his fingers explored the strong line of his jaw, rough with day-old stubble. Danny, for his part, looked as spellbound as Steve felt. This connection of theirs had been building since they’d pulled their guns on each other that day in the garage. But they’d both been a mess that first year. Steve knew that now. They’d both needed to adjust. To heal. Funny that it should be now, this moment, when they finally took this step. His life, certainly, had thrown him for yet another loop over the past few days, but maybe it wasn’t about the mess or chaos life threw at them.

Maybe it was just time. _Their_ time.

Steve had all but closed that last little bit of distance between them, his eyes on Danny’s mouth, when he felt Danny’s touch on his wrist, his hand warm and callused. Steve did close the gap then, but instead of going for the kiss he’d intended he nuzzled against his partner’s cheek with a quiet, inquisitive noise. “Danno?” 

Even he could hear how vulnerable he sounded. Steve pulled back suddenly, confused and uncertain, but before he could even think of breaking away Danny’s grip tightened just enough to hold him there. “Hey, no, no, don’t do that,” Danny said. “It’s good, Steve. We’re—God, how could I _not_ want you?” He’d closed his eyes at some point, because then Steve felt Danny kiss his forehead, then his nose, before pressing the briefest, softest little kiss to his mouth. “C’mon, open those eyes, babe. Look at me.” 

Steve did, then, blinking his eyes open. A huff of laughter escaped him when he realized how close they were, Danny’s face right there on the pillow next to him now. But Danny was smiling, and he—Steve’s breath caught when Danny adjusted his grip on Steve’s wrist and turned his head to press his lips against the center of his palm. 

“You and me, babe? We’re so good,” Danny murmured then. He let go of Steve’s wrist and traced his fingers along Steve’s jaw just like Steve had done to him moments before. “But you’ve had a hell of a lot more to drink tonight than I have, and it’s been—you’ve been through a lot, you know? I’m just checking in.” 

Steve digested that speech slowly, the gentle touch soothing the anxiety that had momentarily reared its head. “You asking if I really want this, Danny? If I really want you?” 

“If you want to put it that way, Steven.” Danny’s fingers slid up to skim along Steve’s cheekbone and then down again, pausing at the corner of his mouth. “I’m asking.” He traced Steve’s bottom lip. Danny’s hands were as callused as his were, but his touch was gentle. “You’re too important to me to do this any other way.” 

That quiet statement eased the last of that worry that had flared when Danny stopped him. “The answer’s yes,” he whispered, and Steve let out a soft sigh when Danny went still, pressing that finger lightly into his lip. 

“Yeah?” Danny’s eyes crinkled; even in the moonlight Steve could see the way he lit up. “Okay then, babe.” He peppered Steve’s face with those sweet kisses again, and this time Steve’s eyes were open as their lips touched. That one lingered a little longer, that first kiss melting into a series of soft, almost chaste pecks. 

It was not how Steve had imagined their first kiss. Somehow, he’d always thought they’d be mid-argument when it happened, one kissing the other to shut him up. Or that the unresolved tension between them would linger on until the next time one of them (him, probably, he conceded) narrowly escaped death or major injury. Instead of it being in the heat of the moment, though, it happened on a Tuesday when his mother, newly back from the dead, had gone into witness protection after lying to him yet again. 

Just another day at the office, albeit one that had left him particularly drained. Steve’s emotions were a mess, but he was sober enough to know what he wanted and to know that, too. And that his heart was right on his sleeve, that compartment he tried to keep it safely tucked away in wide open given everything that had happened since that door opened in Japan. 

But the kiss— _kisses_ —were perfect.

So when Danny let his hand drop down, his fingers grazing Steve’s chin and down over his sternum before he laced their hands together, Steve didn’t try to pull away. But he was aware his expression must show his hint of disappointment that they weren’t kissing _more_. 

“I can hear you thinking, Steven.” Danny squeezed his hand. “We’ve got all the time in the world, babe. Maybe since you swam your ten miles or whatever it was tonight, we can sleep in a little tomorrow. Or… not sleep.” Another soft peck, this on Steve’s cheek. “Maybe talk a little, kiss a _little_ more tonight, then tomorrow we’ll have ourselves a night in.” 

“So… like a date night?” Steve asked. Before Danny could answer, he pressed on. “Because now I’m doing the asking, Daniel. You want to date me?” 

“Oh, babe.” Danny grinned at him then, quick and warm. “What we’ve been doing these past two years could be classified as dating, pretty sure. But yes, a date night. Movie, dinner, maybe I’ll let you get a little handsy with me on the couch if you want.” Danny nudged his nose against Steve’s. “That sound all right with you?”

Steve smiled back. “You forgot the morning kisses.” 

Danny gave a little mock gasp. “So I did. All right,” he amended. “Tonight we talk, maybe enjoy some good night kisses, then tomorrow good morning kisses or… you know, see where that goes. And _then_ all that date night business.” His thumb was rubbing Steve’s knuckles, their arms folded and twined together now so that they rested against Steve’s chest. “That better?” 

“Okay.” Steve inched a little closer and nudged with one knee until their legs were tangled comfortably together. “This all right?” That they were taking this slow was probably not the worst idea in the world. He could feel the weight of the day on him still, though every touch and kiss chipped away at it. These quiet whispers in the calm and comfort of his bed were helping, too. 

“Very much so,” Danny whispered back. He was quiet a moment, then Steve heard the soft inhale before spoke again. “How you doing, babe? Really?” 

He wasn’t asking about this shift in their relationship. Steve knew that. No, it was the news Danny had brought when he met him at the airstrip that evening. His mother, the lies, the whole revelation that this was what Joe had been hiding from him. 

Steve wasn’t sure how to answer that question, because he just didn’t know. His thoughts were still too muddled to make much sense of. He was angry, yes, but the hurt and betrayal cut deeper than anything else. “I don’t get it,” he said at last. 

“What don’t you get?” Danny squeezed his hand again but waited while Steve considered his next words. Steve appreciated that; he loved that with Danny he didn’t always need words to convey what he needed to. 

“How she could do it.” Steve looked down at the shadow of their linked hands. “I know what she said about why she did it, how she thought it was best. But _how,_ Danny? How could she just… walk away from us? Make us go through that, thinking she was dead?” He swallowed hard.

When he looked up again, his eyes were stinging. “ _You_ wouldn’t do something like that.” It wasn’t a question; Steve knew to the depths of his soul that Danny could not, would not _ever_ do that to Grace. _Or to him_ , his mind supplied. Danny had come halfway around the world to be with his little girl, had gone halfway across the world to save Steve and bring him back home from North Korea. 

“You’re right, babe, I would not.” Steve almost protested when Danny let go of his hand but then he felt the way he touched his cheek, his hand warm and soothing as it slid into Steve’s hair. “I don’t want to disrespect your mother, Steve,” he began, and in the silence as that opening hung out there Steve could hear his own ragged breaths, and he swallowed again against the hot, uncomfortable feeling he was fighting with all his might. But a watery-sounding bark of laughter escaped him a moment later. Danny and Doris had gotten off to a spectacularly bad start. Steve was pretty sure he’d been able to actually taste his partner’s outrage after that face-off in the car. 

But Danny just pulled him gently closer, cradling the back of his head. “I don’t get it either, Steve. I’m sorry.” Steve felt Danny’s lips on his cheekbone, then more soft words against his wet skin, the tears apparently falling despite his best efforts to hold them in. “I’m so, so sorry you had to live through that. And that you had to find out the way you did, and then today…” He felt Danny sigh. “It’s a shitty situation, Steve, I won’t even try to sugarcoat that.” 

“When have you ever?” Steve pointed out. His voice was uneven, but there was a laugh lurking beneath the veil of tears. 

“Point taken.” Danny kept kissing away those tears and scratching lightly at Steve’s scalp. “You deserved better. You and Mary, and your old man, too. And this?” He slid his hand down to Steve’s cheek again, thumbing away the tears that were still falling. “Long, long overdue, I’m guessing.” Danny pulled Steve in close, wrapping himself around him. “But I’ve got you, okay? Let it out.” 

He didn’t know how. But as he lay there wrapped in Danny’s arms and surrounded by his familiar scent, Steve pressed his face into Danny’s neck and just clung to him. And let himself break, at last. He shook so violently that he was halfway convinced he was going to fly apart into pieces, but Danny just held on tighter, rubbing his back and murmuring those same soft words over and over again until the tremors tapered off. Steve let the tears fall until they stopped, until his throat was scratchy, his eyes were sore, and that terrible weight in the middle of his chest was gone. Then he clung some more, breathing noisily until Danny moved one arm, stretching over to reach the tissues. 

Danny was gentle as he mopped Steve’s face up and made him blow his nose. He laughed a little self-consciously at that as Danny disposed of the tissues and they settled back into a comfortable tangle of limbs, their heads on the same pillow again. Suddenly he was tired. So tired. Danny’s hand was stroking his hair again, though, that gentle touch soothing him. Then more soft kisses, these accompanied by quiet words encouraging him to sleep. 

Steve was out before he could respond.


End file.
